Riding a bus, pedalling a bike, wildfire risk and air quality initiatives were approved to the tune of $30,000 at the Columbia Shuswap Regional District board meeting on May 18 in Falkland.
On May 2, Golden Town Council passed three resolutions in support of the projects, which subsequently received support from Electoral Area A Director Karen Cathcart.
Mayor Ron Oszust and Cathcart asked members of the board to support their requests for funding from the Golden and Area A Economic Opportunity Fund (EOF) for three initiatives.
Unanimous support was given to $10,000 for Air Quality and Wildfire Risk Reduction facilitation, the subject of a successful, inaugural roundtable on May 15. The two-hour meeting brought together reps from several organizations, including provincial and local municipal government, local licensees, organizations and societies working in the Golden area. More collaborative roundtable meetings are planned for the future.
CSRD directors were also on-board with $5,000 for a cost-shared Transit Feasibility Report.
Oszust says there was an opportunity to engage BC Transit again in order to update the transit feasibility study that was undertaken in 2004.
“After the study was done, we did have a transit system in place from 2007 to 2012 when the council of the day stepped away from the partnership with BC Transit,” he says of the Kicking Horse Transit system that operated through a tripartite agreement between the Town of Golden, CSRD and BC Transit. “At the time, it was the most expensive transit system per rider in all of B.C.”
BC Transit will look at what options are available and provide a couple of service scenarios using the suite of transit options that are traditionally delivered through the BC Transit partnership model, with Golden being the partner.
Considering the possibility of re-introducing a transit system in the area, Cathcart says she wants the service to go beyond municipal boundaries.
“It has to have something in place for rural residents,” she says. “That’s really important and I’ll be pushing it from that that perspective.”
Oszust and Cathcart asked that $15,000 be approved for the Golden Cycling Club to undertake an economic impact study of mountain biking.
“Mountain biking has grown massively in our area, and without data like this, it’s hard to quantify the economic impact,” says Oszust. ‘This is just another activity and attraction we have in our area, and while lots of people mountain bike, we need to find out how much is happening.”
Oszust pointed out that, the completion of an economic impact study opens up opportunities to apply for grants.
From her perspective, Cathcart says she is grateful for the Economic Opportunities Fund and, in terms of the request for funding for the economic impact study on mountain biking says, “data is knowledge and knowledge is what moves it forward.”
